De fato (Marcus Tullius Cicero)
- Language:
- Latin
- Status:
- Complete work
- Authorship:
- Written by the author
- Condition of the text:
- No scanning noise detected (automatic measure over the whole text, not checked by hand)
- Extent:
- ~6,110 words · 29 passages
Cite this work
- APACicero. (n.d.). De fato (Marcus Tullius Cicero). Digital reproduction: SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/cicero/de-fato-marcus-tullius-cicero
- MLACicero. De fato (Marcus Tullius Cicero). Digital reproduction, SigPhi, https://sigphiai.com/en/works/cicero/de-fato-marcus-tullius-cicero.
- ChicagoCicero. De fato (Marcus Tullius Cicero). Digital reproduction, SigPhi. https://sigphiai.com/en/works/cicero/de-fato-marcus-tullius-cicero.
Reference to the edition that SigPhi reproduces: SigPhi is its digital reproduction, not its publisher. The edition's year is not in the metadata (hence "n.d."), and the translator appears only when recorded.
What it is about
The Latin original of Cicero's treatise on fate, of 44 BC, preserved incomplete.
Context and history
The text we have begins in the middle and ends in the middle: the opening, the close and stretches in between are lost, and what remains is the central part of a conversation with Hirtius. The question is whether everything is determined, and Cicero lays out the dispute that had split the schools: Chrysippus with fate chained to causes, Epicurus with his random swerve of the atoms, and between them Carneades — which is where Cicero leans — holding that one can maintain that judgements about the future are true or false without thereby chaining the will. Here is the 'lazy argument' — if everything is written, why call the doctor? — and Chrysippus's distinction between perfect and auxiliary causes. It is the principal source for that whole ancient debate, and the debate is exactly the one still had about determinism and freedom, with the names changed.
Editorial context, not a citable source: unlike the passages of the work itself, these statements cannot be checked against the corpus.
[20] Nec ei qui dicunt inmutabilia esse quae futura sint nec posse verum futurum convertere in falsum, fati necessitatem confirmant, sed verborum vim interpretantur. At qui introducunt causarum seriem sempiternam, ei mentem hominis voluntate libera spoliatam necessitate fati devinciunt. Sed haec hactenus; alia videamus. Concludit enim Chrysippus hoc modo: 'Si est motus sine causa, non omnis enuntiatio (quod axioma dialectici appellant) aut vera aut falsa erit; causas enim efficientis quod non habebit, id nec verum nec falsum erit; omnis autem enuntiatio aut vera aut falsa est; motus ergo sine causa nullus est. [21] Quod si ita est, omnia, quae fiunt, causis fiunt antegressis; id si ita est, fato omnia fiunt; efficitur igitur fato fieri, quaecumque fiant.' Hic primum si mihi libeat adsentiri Epicuro et negare omnem enuntiationem aut veram esse aut falsam, eam plagam potius accipiam quam fato omnia fieri conprobem; illa enim sententia habet aliquid disputationis, haec vero non est tolerabilis. Itaque contendit omnis nervos Chrysippus, ut persuadeat omne axioma aut verum esse aut falsum. Ut enim Epicurus veretur, ne, si hoc concesserit, concedendum sit fato fieri, quaecumque fiant, (si enim alterum utrum ex aeternitate verum sit, esse id etiam certum et, si certum, etiam necessarium; ita et necessitatem et fatum confirmari putat), sic Chrysippus metuit, ne, si non obtinuerit omne, quod enuntietur, aut verum esse aut falsum, non teneat omnia fato fieri et ex causis aeternis rerum futurarum. [22] Sed Epicurus declinatione atomi vitari necessitatem fati putat. Itaque tertius quidam motus oritur extra pondus et plagam, cum declinat atomus intervallo minimo (id appellat elachiston). Quam declinationem sine causa fieri si minus verbis, re cogitur confiteri. Non enim atomus ab atomo pulsa declinat. Nam qui potest pelli alia ab alia, si gravitate feruntur ad perpendiculum corpora individua rectis lineis, ut Epicuro placet?…